caesura

American  

[si-zhoor-uh, -zoor-uh, siz-yoor-uh] / sɪˈʒʊər ə, -ˈzʊər ə, sɪzˈyʊər ə /

noun

caesuras, plural caesurae plural

1. Prosody. a break, especially a sense pause, usually near the middle of a verse, and marked in scansion by a double vertical line, as in know then thyself ‖ presume not God to scan.

2. Classical Prosody. a division made by the ending of a word within a foot, or sometimes at the end of a foot, especially in certain recognized places near the middle of a verse.

3. any break, pause, or interruption.

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caesura British  

/ sɪˈzjʊərə /

noun

1. Usual symbol: ||.  (in modern prosody) a pause, esp for sense, usually near the middle of a verse line

2. (in classical prosody) a break between words within a metrical foot, usually in the third or fourth foot of the line

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Other Word Forms

• caesural
  adjective
• caesuric
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of caesura

1550–60; < Latin, equivalent to caes ( us ) cut (past participle of caedere ) ( caed- cut + -tus past participle suffix) + -ūra -ure

Explanation

A caesura is a break in a conversation, a line of verse, or a song. Usually, a caesura means total silence, but not for long. A caesura is a pause, or an interruption. In musical notation, a caesura is a break in the music, which can be a good time for a trumpet player to catch his breath. A caesura is also a break in the middle of a line of poetry. It is sometimes marked by a question mark, exclamation point, or period, as in the Sylvia Plath poem “Mirror”: “I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers."

Example Sentences

For Rapsody’s verse, medial caesura fashions a rhythmic back and forth — a left-foot, right-foot two-step.

From New York Times • Mar. 4, 2021

If the pandemic had a musical score, that trick ending might be a caesura, shown by two parallel diagonal lines: railroad tracks, only we ran out of rail.

From The Guardian • Jul. 5, 2020

Alone on the sea for weeks, Fox has a moment of caesura in his own life, and he finds the experience both rewarding and frightening.

From Slate • Dec. 3, 2019

That is a semicolon from the heavens, you know, it’s like the most amazing caesura, to say these two things that are simultaneous and true.

From The New Yorker • Feb. 20, 2019

These anti-accentual rhythms are continually found in Virgil, Ovid, &c. from a fondness for caesura, where the older writers have qui Troiae, and the like.

From The History of Roman Literature From the earliest period to the death of Marcus Aurelius by Cruttwell, Charles Thomas